Sunday, May 20, 2012

Going Up

Luke 24:44-53

May 20, 2012

What
goes up must come down.

It
was my internship year in a church in Chester, Virginia.I, along with other advisers and parents, had
taken the senior high youth on a ski trip in the Blue Ridge Mountains.My only problem was that I had never been
skiing before.

So
when we got to the resort, I took a ski lesson.It was a helpful thing to do.The
most important thing I learned was how to stop.I figured that was a good thing to know when I was riding two waxed
sticks down a mountain.The instructor
said we were ready to go down the bunny slope, so we got in line for the
lift.Joe, my other youth adviser, rode
up the lift with me.He had never been
skiing either.We were excited about our
first venture on the slopes until we realized we had one problem – we didn’t
know how to get off the lift.

Many
of the youth and other parents were already heading down the slopes, so we
started yelling out to them, “Hey!How
do you get off the lift?”The other people
in our group would smile up at us.They’d wave.They’d give us the
thumbs up.But they didn’t answer our
question.So we kept yelling at any
person on the slopes we recognized and probably even a few we didn’t.

“Seriously,
how do we get off the lift?”

Seriously,
how do we get off the lift?

Even
though we never got an answer to our question, we managed to get off the lift
without killing ourselves.But I
remember that I was more scared of the prospect of getting off that lift than I
was about skiing itself.I thought that
going down that mountain couldn’t be nearly as frightening as just taking that
first step off a moving chair.

I
was right and I was wrong.Going down
the mountain was daunting to be sure, but at least I’d had some instruction.I had some idea of what to do.That wasn’t true about getting off the
lift.Even with the lift operator
waiting there, I still felt very unsure, very alone, very uninstructed about
how to proceed.But what goes up must
come down.I went up that mountain so I
had to come down.I got off the lift.

I
wonder if that’s how the disciples felt when they watched Jesus make his final
ascent.Did they have one more
question?One more point they wanted
clarified?

The
scene that Luke describes at the end of his gospel sounds beatific and
serene.Jesus has opened the disciples’
minds to the scriptures.He’s told them
once more how he is the fulfillment of all the prophecies.Jesus declared to them what the crucifixion
and the resurrection meant and how it was essential that it happened.He declared to them that they were witnesses
of all these things.He told them that
he would send to them what the Father promised, which we know is the Holy
Spirit.He instructed them to remain in
the city until they have been clothed with power from on high.Then he took them out as far as Bethany, raised
his hands and blessed them.Luke writes
that “While he was blessing them, he withdrew from them and was carried up into
heaven.And they worshiped him, and
returned to Jerusalem with great joy; and they were continually in the temple
blessing God.”

Luke’s
words paint a lovely picture.The
disciples have come a long way since Jesus first called them.But as I often do when I am trying to get a
better understanding of a particular passage or story, I put myself into that
scene.As much as I’d like to believe
that I would be there soaking up Jesus’ final blessing, worshiping him,
praising God, I also know myself better than that.I would be the disciple with one more
question.

“Okay
Jesus, I get that we’re to be witnesses of these things.But does that mean that I witness to people I
know first or should I go to stranger’s houses?”

“How
do I start the conversation?Should I
just tell them about this guy I know or do quote scripture?”

“Did
you leave a list?”

“Seriously,
how do we get off the lift?”

I
know me.And I’ve also gleaned a few
insights into human nature.I can well
imagine that these questions, whether I asked them out loud or not, would have
been running through my head as I watchedmy teacher, my friend, my mentor leave me.I probably would have felt unprepared and
completely unskilled for the task that lay at hand.I would have wanted to know, specifically and
in great detail, exactly what I was supposed to do next.

I
wonder if at least some of the disciples weren’t feeling this as well.In our verses from Acts, the disciples do ask
Jesus if this is the time of Israel’s restoration.But the answer they get feels far from
satisfactory.

“It
is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own
authority.But you will receive power
when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in
Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

In
other words, wait.Power from on high is
coming to you through the Holy Spirit and you will be witnesses, so wait.

Like
I said, if I were one of the ones standing there, I would have wanted a few
more details.Waiting is all very well
and good and knowing that this Holy Spirit you speak of is coming is fine.But how do you get off the lift?!

When
I dropped off Phoebe at choir rehearsal the other night, I walked through the
choir room to go to my office.A
question was put to me about the title for today’s sermon.I’ll be honest with you.I hate titles.The best titles come from what I’ve written. But like other pastors I know, we don’t have
our sermons written early in the week.And even though I’m doing a lot of thought
work and reading for my sermon on Tuesdays, I rarely have a concrete idea of
where the sermon is going yet.So
creating a title is hard for me.

Regardless, I didn’t
have a set title in my head yet although I knew I was preaching on the
ascension.When I got the question about
my title I jokingly replied, “I don’t know, ‘Going Up’”.So I stuck with that, thinking that was as
appropriate for today’s worship as anything else I could come up with.After all, when we read about the ascension
we read that Jesus goes up into the clouds, into his Father’s realm, into
heaven.

But just as I realized
with the story of the resurrection on Easter – that I don’t have to have the
ability to explain it in literal terms, just grasp as best I can what it means
for us now – is true for the ascension as well.I don’t think it matters if Jesus went up, down or sideways.I don’t think it’s essential for our
understanding to know for a fact if he went up into heaven or disappeared or
blended into the background of clouds.I
realize that many people take the angels’ words to the disciples
literally.Why are you looking up?He’ll be coming back to you the same way he
left you.So a lot of folks stand around
watching the heavens, waiting.I don’t
think we need to do that.I don’t think
we’re called to do that.

I do think and believe
that in one way or another Jesus, the physical human being, left.He left the disciples.But before he left he gave them instructions.No, it wasn’t a complete to-do list with
every step spelled out in exact detail.Yet they were instructions nonetheless.The disciples were to be witnesses of these things.

Two of the preachers
that I read this week in preparation for today referred to this as the “passing
of the baton.”Jesus leaves and when he
leaves he passes the baton to the disciples.It’s up to them now.They have to
take the message forward.They have to
proclaim the kingdom of God.It’s up to
them.Jesus goes up.Now they have to go out.

Go out into the
world.Go out into Jerusalem.Into Judea.Into Samaria.Into all the world
and preach the good news.That’s what
the ascension is.It’s passing the
baton.It’s putting the responsibility
on the witnesses to go and do and tell.

When I think about the
disciples being told to go out, I think of a wonderful scene from the movie Bruce Almighty.Bruce Nolan is a cynical human interest
reporter in Buffalo, New York.He blames
God for all his bad luck. Finally God has enough of this.If Bruce thinks being God is so easy, then
let Bruce do it for a while. God, played brilliantly by Morgan Freeman, gives
all of his powers to Bruce.Bruce
doesn’t handle this well.He uses the
powers he’s given to further his own interests first.As you can imagine, things don’t turn out
well.So he has another meeting with
God.At the end of the scene God is
going to leave him again, but he reassures Bruce that he has all the ability he
needs to do God’s job.Bruce wants to
know, though where he can find God if he needs him.God tells him to stop looking up for
God.Too many people spend their time
looking up, thinking all the answers will just magically come from the
heavens.If you want to know where God
is, if you want to find the answers, look here (point to head and heart).Look out there (point around the sanctuary
and towards the outside).That’s where
God is.

That’s
where God is.Here and out there and all
around us.Jesus has left this earth but
we are not left empty-handed.Jesus goes
up but the power of Holy Spirit is about to come down.And when that happens, the disciples are
never the same people again.Neither are
we.We don’t have to wait until next
Sunday, the day of Pentecost, to feel the power of the Holy Spirit.All we have to do is trust in the good news
that we are not alone, that we have all the abilities and skills we need to
pick up that baton and go out.Jesus
went up.The Holy Spirit comes
down.And we are called to go out.Let all God’s children say “Amen!”